The Latest Outrage

Anyone who has visited this site in the past knows I have little respect for the current presidential administration. But as bad as things have gotten, I do not think anything has gotten under my skin like this recent report in Salon. It alleges that the U.S. military has been sending injured soldiers back into active military units to artificially boost its numbers -- in effect, faking the troop surge we have been hearing so much about. According to the story, military officials have been altering medical records to make injured patients look like they can still serve.

Setting aside the point that this means the so-called troop surge may be a fiction, we are faced with the very serious possibility that the Bush administration is tampering with private medical records for political purposes. As a medical doctor, I cannot even begin to express how appalled I am at this possibility. A patient's medical record is considered scientific, and scientific data should never be altered for any non-scientific reason. Tainted data are useless data, and must be thrown out.

What is a soldier supposed to do if, twenty years from now, he is unable to work, and is claiming disability based on war injuries? If the records are inaccurate, the severity of injury cannot be proven. This leaves an ex-soldier without means of justifying need for long-term medical treatment.

I really don't care what side of the war on terrorism you are on. Falsifying medical information is completely out of bounds, even in when national security is an issue. You cannot win a war by cooking medical information. I would have thought even the current administration was not that stupid, but I guess I was wrong. 

Comments

[Denise Napoli]

My name is Denise Napoli. I am an assistant editor with International Medical News Group, a division of Elsevier, which publishes monthly and biweekly magazines in different medical fields. I am trying to get in touch with a doctor/blogger who would be interested in speaking with me and possibly writing a short column for our magazines on doctors that blog about their practice and patients, and what is or isn't acceptable for them to discuss, and why. For more information, please e-mail me at d.napoli@elsevier.com. Visit our Web site at www.imng.com. Thanks for your time.

[Phillip Gordon]

MH,

I posted on this too. I was a little less PC about it though. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.

Ex Utero